


Still Life Photography at the End of the World

by resurrection_en_menthe



Category: Pacific Rim (2013)
Genre: Angst, Character Death, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, One Shot, some Yancey/Tendo if you squint
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-31
Updated: 2014-05-31
Packaged: 2018-01-27 16:48:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,233
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1717652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/resurrection_en_menthe/pseuds/resurrection_en_menthe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Loss can be swift, vicious, stabbing. Loss can be drawn-out, aching. Raleigh loses and loses as the apocalypse comes, and his only anchors are the old camera and stacks of photos in his duffel bag. And maybe Chuck Hansen.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Still Life Photography at the End of the World

**Author's Note:**

  * For [bordello_blues](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bordello_blues/gifts).



> I don’t own Pacific Rim or these characters. This fic came from a discussion bordello_blues and I had. Thanks again to her for the inspiration and the beta!
> 
> All comments, positive and constructive, are appreciated! :)

Still Life Photography at the End of the World

 

Traveling is the Becket family’s favorite activity, so the house is covered with photographs Mrs. Becket takes wherever they go. Framed, sorted in albums, taped to the walls, held in place by magnets on the fridge. Baby Raleigh in a bright red corduroy jumper feeding one of the famous Nara deer of Japan; Prague’s Charles Bridge in the spring. Budapest. Munich. Panama. Taiwan.

When Yancey and Raleigh quit school and sign up for the Jaeger Academy, it’s been a few years since the Becket brothers have traveled or had parents. Their worn, dusty duffel bags contain only a change of clothes, a toothbrush, and photos neatly held together by blue grocery store rubber bands. Raleigh has their father’s hunting knife; Yancey, their mother’s old Leica camera. 

Somewhere down the line, perhaps after Gipsy’s third kill, Yancey begins to take pictures with the Leica whenever they travel to a new city or Shatterdome. He always manages to find a print shop; gets all of the film developed as black-and-white photos and pins up his favorites in the Becket quarters. 

Yancey thinks he’s an artist; Raleigh knows he’s just a romantic. 

***

A small cardboard box with Yancey’s things sits at the foot of the bunk bed and it has Raleigh tasting iron between his teeth and salt water on his lips every time he sees it. Yancey’s dead and Raleigh hears his brother’s scream in his ears day and night. His left arm burns even though the doctors can’t find a reason why. His chest aches no matter the number of drinks or hours that go by.

A week after Knifehead’s attack, Raleigh Becket disappears from the Anchorage Shatterdome and leaves a brown box outside Tendo Choi’s room. On top, a black and white picture of the Golden Gate Bridge. On the back of the photo, written neatly: “You’re the only brother I have left in Anchorage now. I’m sorry to leave this to you.”

The photos held together with blue grocery store rubber bands and the Leica are not in the box. 

***

Raleigh jumps from freighter ship to train to bus to truck attempting to find work on the Wall. Travel is the antidote, always has been for Beckets. The anonymity and payment are just perks.

Toxic blue ocean waves pound the once-beautiful shores of Long Beach. The air is wet and salty on his chapped lips through the shelter’s rough metal walls. “Raleigh listen to me—“ rings in his ears and pain shoots from his left shoulder down to his grease-caked hand.  
***

He doesn’t remember how or why, but Raleigh starts taking photos. They suck. 

Blurry, off angle, over or under exposed. Not for any artistic reasons; because he simply doesn’t know anything about photography and the damn camera except that it’s his family now. Raleigh buys a fox-eared, water-logged book from a couple scavenging the San Diego coastline titled ‘Basics of Photography’. He’s not sure if the photos get better, but he begins amassing a collection that he’s proud of. The steel skeleton of the Wall casting black, black shadows against the late afternoon sun. A fox sitting casually under a motel’s harsh parking lot lights. A pancake he thought looked a little bit like a monkey’s head. A hat with moose antlers on it. But not the ocean. Not of people. 

Raleigh watches the motel TV idly, a CNN report on gross safety negligence in first generation Jaegers. A pilot with sharp blue eyes and a cocky smile is showing a reporter the left arm of Australia’s up-and-coming Mark V. Impressive terms and specs roll of his tongue. 

Raleigh turns the TV off in disgust. That ranger couldn’t have been more than eighteen. What had the PPDC become, sending children to war?

***  
Five years later, Pentecost tracks him down. His words don’t convince Raleigh to get on that chopper; the lancing pain in Raleigh’s left shoulder does. The Marshall raises an eyebrow as Raleigh walks towards the black helicopter. Are you ready? Of course not. But if the world does end, he’d rather not have Yancey calling him a coward from Heaven. 

The Hong Kong Shatterdome is a cathedral. Iron walls and doors going black from age and ocean water lift the cement ceilings high; the nave is where the last Jaegers stand tall. The way sunlight falls on Cherno Alpha’s fists, still dripping seawater and Kaiju blood? Almost holy. Raleigh moves to grab his camera, but is stopped by the approach of Hercules Hansen, whom he greets. He spends the entire day seeing familiar and new faces. Tendo hugs him, fingers digging a little deeper than necessary into his scapula to say hello.

The first day at the Shatterdome is exhausting but jetlag keeps Raleigh awake. So he walks around, taking photos. Empty hallways, a wall with writing in four languages telling you that you’re in the cafeteria. The deck where the lights of Hong Kong wink in the nighttime. He doesn’t see a young pilot sitting on top of the metal railings, dangling his feet over the violent ocean, his bulldog in tow. Watching him until he walks back indoors.

 

***  
A Ranger’s life is short; don’t waste my time. Chuck must have taken Yancey’s favorite sound-byte, the one he always gave on TV interviews, to heart. Raleigh has never seen someone so immature and cocksure. Well, that’s not true. He winces at the thought of some of his past behavior. Herc and Raleigh have lunch in silence after the younger Hansen leaves the mess hall. As the older ranger stands up to leave, he gives a small smile.

“He’s got good moments. When he uh…smiles, like his mum. Thinks I don’t know, but…I see ‘im.”

“Trying to tell me he doesn’t need a kick in the pants, sir?” asks Raleigh, behind his coffee cup.

Herc lets out a short laugh and a shrug. “Trying to tell you there’s a reason why I haven’t decided what to do with him yet.”

***  
That night, Raleigh cannot sleep and discovers a makeshift garden on the roof of the Shatterdome. Yellow sodium lights cast an eerie glow, and Raleigh’s pretty sure that the photos he takes of at the rooftop garden will look really good once they get developed. 

The metal rooftop door abruptly swings open, causing him to straighten up when he recognizes the figure. Shoulders back, spine straight, the posture created by years of military training clashes with the smile and soft eyes beaming at a happy, snuffling Max. “You better not eat anything up here, can’t have you getting sick!” Chuck jokes and lifts his head to survey the rooftop. And freezes.

The humid air goes still, the ocean’s howl and this goddamn end of humanity are suddenly, obviously irrelevant. 

Trying to tell you there’s a reason why I haven’t decided what to do with him yet. 

A Ranger’s life is short; don’t waste my time. 

Raleigh doesn’t remember how he finds his way back to his quarters. All he knows is that his heart beat roars in his ears like the waves pounding the Shatterdome. 

***  
Raleigh goes back to the Kwoon after Mako gives up being his co-pilot. Alright, she didn’t ‘give up’. But Raleigh’s angry and maybe a few more katas will burn off the frustration and dull ache in his body. As he rounds the corner, he finds the exact opposite: Chuck Hansen throwing lightning fast boxing punches in the middle of the Kwoon. He’s a professional killer: no wasted moves, completely focused. 

As a fellow Ranger, Raleigh is thoroughly impressed. As a man, Raleigh wants to memorize him with his fingers and camera.

“Stare anymore and you’ll have to pay for this view, Ra-leigh,”

Raleigh walks down the three steel stairs into the Kwoon. “Then you owe me ten dollars. Saw some impressive staring coming from your direction during my co-pilot tryouts today.” 

At that, Chuck smirks. Striding up to Raleigh so they are toe-to-toe, he begins to undo the wrappings on his hands and wrists. There is a feral and barely controlled hunger in the look he gives him.

“Twenty. But only if you make it…” he leans right next to Raleigh’s ear and whispers, “…interesting for me.” 

The arousal and anger warm Raleigh’s body and he realizes that the flickers of life that have been re-ignited in him by Mako have been made a forest fire by Chuck.

Chuck turns to toss him a fighting stick. One, two, more rounds than Raleigh can remember go by. They ease their bodies in the hot shower and eventually Raleigh’s bed. The following morning, Chuck is gone but twenty Australian dollars are on his pillow. 

And for the first time in years, Raleigh laughs and does not wake up in pain or screaming from the nightmares.

***  
When the world is ending, there is no time for chocolate milk or pets or love.

Well, that’s not entirely true.

There is chocolate milk in the mess hall. Max appears to be not just Chuck’s but everyone’s pet.

But there is absolutely no time for love. Because love isn’t someone you punch in the morning for calling your partner a bitch and sucks your cock with that unbelievably talented and sarcastic mouth an hour later. It isn’t quiet begging, sharp inhalations, and fucking in forgotten rooms and the middle of the night only to break away and pretend nothing happened.

Well, he can’t let it be, he reminds himself, feeling the heaviness of the camera in his hands.

***  
“Get that bloody thing out of my face!” Chuck laughs, swatting the Leica in Raleigh’s hands. Gipsy Danger has just single-handedly (at this, Chuck snorts and rolls his eyes) defeated two Category IV kaiju and that calls for alcohol and several rounds of very athletic, vigorous sex. 

Teasing Chuck makes Raleigh happy and gives him a warm ache in his chest. “Come on. Want something to remember you by when you’re old and fat.” 

“Says the one who’s already old and fat,” says Chuck, making a face. “Honestly though, what’s with the camera and photos? Better to live so fucking well right now that you don’t need a dead weight like that.” He punctuates his words with disdainful pokes at the camera. 

Raleigh forces a smile as Chuck continues. “Don’t need a photo of me anyway. If anything, old man, you’ll be dead by the end of all this and I’m going to make it out of this suicide mission alive, being the attractive, brilliant young thing I am.”

At this Raleigh gets very, very quiet. 

“You’re right,” he finally says, grabbing his jacket and walking towards the door. 

He forgets the Leica in bed, next to a bewildered Chuck.

***  
There’s a knock on Raleigh’s bunk door. It takes a moment for him to decide whether he wants to answer. He sighs and opens it. 

Chuck is in his drivesuit, holding Raleigh’s Leica. His face is carefully devoid of emotion, eyes on everything but him. 

“Forgot this in my room a few hours ago.”  
“Thanks.”

Chuck stops staring at the metal pipes and concrete walls and turns his gaze to Raleigh. Instead of seeing his trademark smirk, Raleigh finds himself looking at wide, red-rimmed eyes. Finally, he swallows and says awkwardly, “So, uh, this is it then.”

Chuck shrugs and toys with his gloves. “Yeah. Showtime.” 

“Going to be okay piloting with the Marshall today?”  
“Won’t be a problem,” Chuck replies abruptly. He pauses and continues carefully, “He and my old man and I had a chat just now. Cleared everything right up.”  
Raleigh’s eyebrows raise slightly, unsure how to respond because he doubts it was just a ‘chat’.

Turning away, Chuck stops again. Barely perceptible, he whispers, “Don’t die on me, yeah?”

“I won’t die until I’ve gotten a photo of you.” Raleigh jokes.

Chuck lets out a ragged laugh and walks away.

This moment, along with Yancey’s last words, haunts Raleigh for weeks after Mako and he survive the mission.

***  
Several months have passed since the final assault on the Breach and Raleigh is finally able to leave the Shatterdome without a swarm of paparazzos, Academy psych analysts, and nightmares attacking him. It’s springtime in Hong Kong and the air is warm as clean blue waves lick the harbor and people fill the streets. Raleigh takes a complex route to a quiet, old, but clean print shop.

“Thirty-six photos developed. All black and white. Becket, right?” asks the old man behind the counter.  
“Right.” He gives a nod of thanks, walks out and begins looking through the photos, weaving carefully through the packed streets.

Pacific Northwest wilderness. The views from the top of the Wall. Some interesting metal rivets in Seattle. Moonbeams cutting through the Hong Kong Shatterdome. Shadows cast on wet concrete. His mess hall tray, with real tomatoes in the spaghetti. A candid of Mako, marking up a Gipsy Danger blueprint. Max sleeping next to Striker Eureka. Some hard candies he’d picked up with interesting wrappers. 

But the last photo. 36 of 36. He didn’t take this. 

It’s a picture of Chuck. His right arm is outstretched, holding the camera. A big smile is on his face, like the one Raleigh saw that night at the top of the Shatterdome. In his left hand, a piece of paper with one word in big, thick black marker:

“Yours.” 


End file.
